It is now "cool" to be willfully ignorant. Any sentence which begins with "I'm not a scientist," but ends with public policy suggestions regarding it, highlights the point. Ignorance has become a homeowner in America's discourse. It has a seat at the "grown folks" table and is asked its opinion. How in the hell did we get here?

We've done it before. In 1980, the world wiped the devastating disease smallpox off the face of the earth -- making it the only human disease eradicated in history. So what does it take to destroy another human disease again?

Sydney-based artist and photographer Alexia Sinclair recently agreed to help The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation send a powerful message. Over the course of several months, she planned, prepared, and captured an image that tells the story of Dr. Edward Jenner's Smallpox Vaccine Discovery.

Familiarity breeds contempt, or at least complacency, and perhaps the annual return of influenza has induced that response. Perhaps that's why we seem to be dismissive of this germ, and overlook what a serious illness it can be. But that tendency is at our peril.

We are in the grips of a military-industrial complex for whom projects such as the Boston Biolab are as much meat and potatoes as any multi-billion dollar weapon system, no matter how dubious the need.